Graeme Clark Collection

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    The spectral maxima sound processor: recent findings in speech perception and psychophysics
    McKay, Colette M. ; McDermott, Hugh J. ; Vandali, Andrew E. ; Clark, Graeme M. (Wien, 1994)
    The Spectral Maxima Sound Processor (SMSP) was developed at the University of Melbourne for use with the Mini System 22 implant manufactured by Cochlear Pty Ltd. The SMSP has been shown in recent studies to provide improved speech perception to implantees when compared to the currently commercially available processor for this implant (the MSP (MULTIPEAK) processor). In the first of three experiments, the effect on speech perception of increasing the rate of stimulation of the SMSP and of increasing the number of electrodes activated in each stimulation cycle was studied. It was found that these parameter changes made little difference to speech perception in quiet but both changes were advantageous for some subjects when listening in noise. The second and third experiments investigated psychophysically the effects of two aspects of the SMSP strategy which differ from previous processors for this implant. In the second experiment, it was found that concurrent stimulation of two adjacent or nearby electrodes evoked a pitch which was intermediate to that of either electrode. This may explain, in part, the better discrimination of vowel formants by users of the SMSP. In the third experiment, it was found that a pitch related to the modulation frequency was evoked by amplitude-modulating a constant rate stimulus, provided that the rate of stimulation was sufficiently high (four times the modulation frequency) or a multiple of the modulation frequency. This result may explain the equal ability of SMSP and MSP users to perceive speaker differences and intonation patterns, even though the rate of stimulation is constant In the SMSP.
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    A new portable sound processor for the University of Melbourne/ Nucleus Limited multielectrode cochlear implant
    McDermott, Hugh J. ; McKay, Colette M. ; Vandali, Andrew E. ( 1992)
    Abstract not available due to copyright.
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    Speech cues for cochlear implantees: spectral discrimination
    Henry, Belinda, A. ; McKay, Colette M. ; McDermott, Hugh, J. ; Clark, Graeme M. (Monduzzi Editore, 1997)
    The relationship between the ability of cochlear implantees to perceive speech and their ability to discriminate between stimulation on adjacent electrodes was investigated. Speech perception ability was assessed with monosyllabic words in 8 users Nucleus cochlear prosthesis. The ability of these subjects to discriminate between stimulation on adjacent electrodes, in of random loudness differences between electrodes was determined. Results were averaged in the apical, mid and basal regions of the cochlea. Regression analysis showed that speech perception ability and electrode discrimination ability were correlated in the apical to mid region of the cochlea. but the two factors were not correlated in the basal region. Therefore, these results suggest that implantees require the ability to discriminate between stimulation on adjacent electrodes in the apical to mid region of the cochlea in order to achieve high speech perception scores.
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    Speech cues for cochlear implantees: spectral discrimination [Abstract]
    Henry, Belinda, A. ; McKay, Colette M. ; McDermott, Hugh, J. ; Clark, Graeme M. ( 1997)
    The ability of cochlear implantees to understand speech varies over a wide range. While some implantees achieve scores close to 100 % open set word tests, other require visual cues to achieve a significant score on these tests. The focus of this research is to investigate reasons for the wide range of ability and therefore to improve the speech processors used by individual implantees. This study first investigated whether the relative importance of various frequency regions of the speech spectrum differs for implantees of different performance levels, and for implantee groups compared to normally hearing subjects.
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    An extension of the Multipeak speech processing strategy for the MSP/MINI 22 cochlear implant system
    Jones, P. A. ; McDermott, H. J. ; Sellgman, P. M. ; Millar, J. B. ( 1992)
    The speech perception of three post-linguistically deaf adults using the Nucleus MSP/Mini System 22 cochlear implant system programmed with a new speech processing strategy, MPEAK+AO. was evaluated. The MPEAK+AO strategy retains all the information of the standard Multipeak speech processing strategy and additionally presents acoustic components below 400Hz to the most-apical electrode. This extra spectral Information may help implantees understand speech, particularly in noise. Since the estimated fundamental frequency is presented as the rate of stimulation at a fixed intracochlear site and is thereby potentially perceived more easily. and the amplitude of the stimulation on the apical electrode, associated with the voice fundamental, Is directly determined from the estimated energy in the relevant spectral region. these coding factors may provide a better representation ot the prosodic information in speech and a more complete auditory feedback signal. The comparison between Multipeak and MPEAK+AO included tests of vowel, consonant and CNC word recognition. Speech materials were presented with both a male and female speaker. Sentence material. presented with background masking noise (four-speaker babble) was also used. The results showed that the new strategy significantly improved the ability of these MSP users to recognise words in open-set sentences in noisy conditions.